Evidence of Sri Lankan 'war crimes' emerge

Channel 4 News showed video footage claiming to show Sri Lankan forces executing Tamils earlier this year.

Just three months after the Sri Lankan government declared the country liberated from the Tamil Tigers, video footage has emerged apparently showing government troops summarily executing Tamils, Jonathan Miller reports for Channel 4..

Journalists for Democracy in Sri Lanka, which obtained the material, said it was filmed in January - when the international media were prevented by the Sri Lankan government from covering the conflict zone.

The Sri Lankan High Commission denied that the Sri Lankan armed forces carried out atrocities against Sri Lankan Tamil community. The High Commission said that they were only engaged in a military offensive against the LTTE.

The Sri Lankan government launched a large scale military offensive in January capturing the Tamil Tiger held town of Kilinochchi. The army then steadily pushed the rebels into an small area of the north-east.

Channel 4 warns that there are extremely disturbing scenes in the report from foreign affairs correspondent Jonathan Miller.

The Sri Lanka High Commission responding to the video said: "The High Commission has noted that in many instances in the past, various media institutions used doctored videos, photographs and documents to defame the Sri Lankan government and armed forces. Therefore, we request you to verify the authenticity of the video footage before the telecast".